The Ballad of the Knight and the Jester
by Grigiocuore
Summary: Once upon a time, in a city of skies and concrete lived a knight and a jester. This is the story about how they bleeded, about how they fought, and how they finally reached for the other. A series of one-shots and flashfics that explore Batman, the Joker and their link. Eventually slash.
1. Chapter 1

_Hi everyone! I'm so excited to present this story, because I worked (and still work!) really hard over it. The project is to describe the important moments in J and B' relationship, and how they slowly discover lights and shadows, pains and strenghts in the other. Some tales will be harsh and hard, others emotional, others rathe silly. I'll try to update every three days, but some chapters are pretty long to translate: I really hope you would like my creature, and that I'll build a believable universe and characters who seem as deep and incredible as they are. If you come up with ideas for a chapter, please let me know it, and I'll gladly try to arrange something. Well, thanks for reading, and enjoy the story. Let's begin._

**A Black Fable**

_Batman_

Night is never silent, in Gotham. The city cries, swears, bursts with life and words and curses; clacson mingle with too many lights. You breathe in the wind and think about all the stories that tangle up and kill each other under you, that wait for you to write their epilogue or their cliffhanger. And you think about _your_ story, the one which has enchained you for years and which you can't, you don't want to end before figuring out at what page you are.

Joker is in front of you, bony fingers playing with the stiletto's blade and head bent. He has just slaughtered five people and he hasn't bothered to clean his cheek; on him red is always obscene. He keeps eyes half-closed, but behind it's a frenzy of green fire.

-Wanna tell you a story, Bats. Maybe you'll find some deep meaning in it.- He wabbles slowly, one foot to the other, one foot to the other. You let him talk, carefully conveying the fisful of adrenalin running under the skin and transforming it in _steel_.

-Once upon a time there was a noble knight with a black cape, and a jester with white hands and a red smile. The knight and the jester lived in a kingdom full of amazing marvels and unforgivable horrors, of sparkling towers and sick skies. But the most incredible thing is that they weren't children of the day, like everyone else; no, they belonged to the night, and at every sunset they run among the kingdom streets, chasing and challenging the other with their powers. The knight indeed could weave magic tapestries, spinning in them tales of honor and peace, and he was sure that, although so many people run away from the judgement of his sword, one day other warriors would understand his mission and take his enchanted banners.- Joker walks on the roof with the broken lightness of a puppet. His voice becomes thick, as if it rises from unimaginable distances. -But don't forget the jester: because he too had a great power, and it was to undo, just with his jokes, every banner the knight entwined, revealing to the kingdom people that even dreams are made of flesh and even they die with oh_, such ridiculous ease_. And for this reason, because the jester tore apart his tapestries and reminded him that they were nothing but blood and fabric, the knight chased him on the manors' roofs all the night, to reclaim the threads he stole and to fabricate another tapestry, a banner even the jester couldn't untie. He hadn't realized that he would never manage to do such a thing.- Joker stops, spreading his arms. -And he hadn't realized that the delirious jokes the jester told were only the true voice of the world.-

You stay still and your armor, the one under the flesh, starts to creak.

_A knight. A jester. Trapped in a black fable, with no writer and no end._

-What is this supposed to mean?- you ask at last.

-Ah, I knew you would asked it. Well, it has no meaning, Bats, just like life.- There is a shadow of gravity on Joker's face. -But it's a good story. And that's enough.-

You watch him smile; when you inhale the air stinks of concrete and burned grease, but suddenly the roofs have the battlements of a medieval fortress, the clock's tollings are temple's bells. Your cape is black, his hands are white, and he has just ripped up your tapestry.

You close your eyes, open them.

One moment, and you jump on him.


	2. His Hunger

_Hi everyone! Thank you so much for your reviews: your comments are so deep and complete, they satisfy every little doubt I can have. This is a short and heavy chapter, and it's the first one I wrote. I hope you'll like it, and I promise more action to come._

_See you soon!_

**Hunger**

_Batman_

The first time you met him, you didn't know that he would devour it all.

You didn't know that your dance would crack your home, drown all the seeds you would be able to cast; you didn't know that his sneer, his broken automaton sneer, would mark your nights and your beloved ones' eyes.

Joker gave up long ago the tidy streets of men, the ones where all the shadows are along the edges and you could pretend they don't exist; Joker is morbid, fierce, unpredictable. And above all, Joker is greedy. Greedy for blood and pain and laughs, ready to swallow the whole life even if it has a cyanide heart. For this reason during the years he tore off from you all he could, bite after bite; he ate Barbara's legs, and when you watch her you can't prevent yourself from thinking about the days when se smiled running with you in the wind, the cape blown up against Gotham's lights like a pair of wings; he ate Jason's life, and now he's just a name carved in marble. He chased you, he tormented you, everytime bringing you a little closer to the abyss. And even if you always came back, you had to leave to the dark a splinter of your heart; you had to become a little less human. And for someone who built his strenght on having the same hands as the ones he defends, there is no crueler exchange.

Joker ate it all, the space for your comrades, your friends, your lovers, leaving a hole that burns and lets enter too many shadows; and then he slipped in the gaps and choked the void in the center of your chest. When the night falls, and you observe the city above a gargoyle's monstrous head you often walk around those still rooms under the skin, searching for a trace, for a sacred corner where you can restart; calling the ones you lost or the ones who are too far to hear you. But the only eyes in the void have the atrocious green of acids and are caught by an hunger without redemption. And even if looking at them poisons you, you can't let it go.

_Can you call enemy someone who pierced through your bones, Batsy?_

You didn't know, when all began, that he would be able to dig such gashes in your flesh.

You didn't know, when all began, that no one else would be here to fill them.


	3. So Scarred

_Hello everyone! Thank you for the support, your're fabolous. While working on some little things for San Valentine's Day, I present you my third chapter. It's pretty short, but I have to describe deeply their relationship. I don't think Bats has ever really hated J, but I'm too partial. Hope you like it..._

_P.S.: I don't talk about real scars; the deep ones aren't in their flesh, but in their minds._

**So Scarred**

_Batman_

It would be simple to hate him.

You said it to yourself so many times, wandering, _without crying, no, never crying_, through the rust of a new duel, through the worn lives of a new plan you couldn't stop in time. You repeated it to yourself because it would be the most natural and rightest and easiest thing; because it wold finally slice a white, clear line between him and you, a border that offers you the sureness of a homeland and frees you from the doubt that your roads belong to the same earth. It would be simple, because that way you could believe that he's not a man anymore and stop asking yourself what being human means. Joker is red and gangrenous darkness; Joker is a frightened child's cry, the fierce laugh of the last soldier in the battlefield. He rose from the acids and the defeat, bringing with him the shadow of a still heart and a madness that resembles too much an icy clearness; he rose and he decided to dance with the death itself, tearing apart every limit with a ruthless lightness that isn't the martyr's one or the warrior's one. It would be simple to hate him, because doubt is a guilt an hero can't afford. It would be simple, but everytime you try behind the eyelids is only intoxicating green.

_You can't do it, can you, Batsy? Because othrwise you would have to admit that for me there is neither grace nor redemption, and that being a paladin doesn't mean anything._

_Isn't that what you fear the most, Bats?_

_No, it isn't that. It isn't that._

You repeat it one hundred times, but words cut the heart and rip the edges, like a scarlet smile.

_See, in the end I've made it, Batsy. Now we're both scarred. We're both blooded dreams. We're brothers._

_And some scars, you know, just never heal._


	4. My Freedom

_Hi guys! Sorry for the delay, but I decided to wait for some incredible writers' comments: I try to give a soul to every chapter, and so it's very important to know what people think about them. Anyway, this one is a little longer: I'm not completely sure about the translation, if you find mistakes please let me know it. I think that freedom is an important topic in Joker's vision, and a difficult matter for Batman. So, thanks for your support, and let's go to the story._

**My Freedom**

There is no sky, in Arkham.

Neons are punches of light along the corridor, but the cell stinks of dark and disinfectant. Joker sits against the farest wall, arms knotted by the straitjacket; his eyes are fogged by the downers, but his smile shines and hurts as always.

-He's completely sedated, but anyway we must move carefully- the doctor explains next to the black knight, just beyond the bars. He's pale, his eyes reek of broken glasses. Nothing intoxicates as much as the shadows of other minds. -Yesterday he pulled out the canteen attendant's eye with a spoon.-

Batman doesn't answer, staring at the man behind the door. He knows that it doesn't help,_ it will never help_, to lock him away from the sun and treat him like a beast because, despite what Joker himself loves believing, to be a dark jester you need first to be a man. To break every rule and every faith, you need first to have believed in them.

_You can't tear another man's heart out, if you don't have it._

The Bat goes near, face illegible. Maybe, this is the turning point. Maybe, this night won't end in anger and blood like all their dances. Maybe.

-Joker, do you hear me? I have to ask you some questions and if you answer them, maybe the jury will revise your case. But I warn you, I will _not_ play tricks.-

The jester's head jerks upward, with mechanic grace. They cut his hair and took away the purple jacket, but his face is still too white, too surreal. And his mind can hide itself in places that most people don't want to see. -Oh, why a guy can never have fun with you, Bats? My tricks are always _so entertaining_.-

Joker laughs, a short braying laugh, looking at the black, impressive figure waiting for his answer. He can understand why a single glimpse of that mask, a quiver of that cape can terrify a lot of criminals and a lot of their victims; but not him. He knows too well the threads around the Bat's heart; and that, if you pull them rightly, you'll make him bleed.

The knight sighs. -All right, cooperate or not, I'll ask you those questions.- Batman clings to the bars, teeth gritted. -Who are you, Joker?-

The grin widens. -I'm the dream you won't dare to confess, I'm the desire you won't admit to have, I'm the horrible word trapped in the throat.-

_I'm the darkness that sprouts with every light._

-If you don't talk you'll have all the time to muse over it, but remember that I won't let you scamper around the city spreading caos any more.- the knight's voice is hard.

-And what will stop me, sugar?-The jester lazily bent his head.

The vigilant looms over him, like a tower. And it's so easy to make a tower fall.

-Because you're pent, Joker. You're a prisoner.-

The man in the cell hides the face in the shadow; another laugh, the one that awakes the monsters in the soul, rises in his throat. His rival doesnt' understand, he's never understood. He doesn't understand that madness is simply a life not stained with guilt, and that to be truly free you have to die a little. He doesn't understand that are precisely he and his dull friends that choke in the spider net of their moral and their justice, in a shell that isn't made for them and cuts the flesh. That they, especially _he_, chase a humanity which will never exist, and don't see that the path is littered by bones.

The laughter gurgles in the dark, filling it, vibrating on the crack at the exact center of every human.

-Am I a prisoner?- he smiles. -Oh no, Batsy. The prisoners are _you_.-


	5. Unconditionally

_Very short chapter, but I swear it's still important: just another glimpse of Bats's head, and of the immortal, terrible hope we love him for. Oh, don't worry, I'll write also pieces about J; and for the romance, take it slow and it will come. Thanks to tihku, Dyn-in-Red and lovejoker, and to every reader. Your reviews are so important._

_P.S.: I've a lot of finished pieces in the pocket, but I'm too lazy to translate it all at the same time. But they'll come, soon I hope. And the title is inspired by Katy Perry, because her music inspires me so much. (Katy Perry with the dark, painful lovestory of J and B? I'm insane.)_

_However, let's go!_

**Unconditionally**

_Batman_

There are words that sink into the flesh, like curses.

It occourred to you as a child, while you were breathing tears and piss over your parents' grey bodies and repeating the only promise which kept the pieces together.

_Never again. Never again._

Soon you discovered that those words hurt, because they germinate under the skin and the roots dig, dig down to the bones, to the heart, until they become a warm knot in the center of the chest that fills the breath and tastes like an empty chasm. You built all your life, all your justice, on that knot in the chest: the bashful knight of Gotham allows himself only faiths marked by blood.

And what you feel for the dark jester, you understood it, is terribly similar: this certainty too was born in blood, in your pain and in the gaze of another man's eyes. And even if you know that is an obscene trust, made of invisible nets of gestures and words, it changed into a point of light behind the flesh; and the vertigo which sears you everytime you meet him is the only hope you have.

_I'll bring him back. I'll show him that there's something worth fighting for._

So you keep trying, tormenting both of you with your stupid hope, scraping your fingers against his sad arrogance, because in Joker there are too many things that scream and could never grow. You know it'll hurt; you know it'll leave scars, and gashes that won't stop bleeding, _no one like who dissected his soul can tear the others' ones apart_. But you know also that if he takes only a step toward you, you'll be there to grasp him: to expose the chest and hold tight onto the man in front of you, even if his hands can squeeze your heart.

Like a hero, _like a man_.

And for this reason tonight you're here again, trying to touch those too green eyes. Waiting for him to take that step, ready to jump in his dark.

Unconditionally.


End file.
